


Spire's Inktober 2019

by MissDragonSpire



Category: Discord Murder Party, Jekyll & Hyde - Wildhorn, Original Work, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde - Robert Louis Stevenson
Genre: 31 Days Challenge, Fiction, Gen, Horror, Inktober 2019, Jekyll and Hyde, More tags to be added as the days pass, Occasional fluff, Original Characters - Freeform, Persona characters, Psychological Horror, Steven Universe: The Movie, Untitled Goose Game - Freeform, Void RP Canon, grim themes, mentions of blood and death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-02
Updated: 2019-11-14
Packaged: 2020-11-15 10:35:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 24
Words: 10,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20864807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissDragonSpire/pseuds/MissDragonSpire
Summary: 31 days of spooky, scary things. Or things in general. We'll see what creepies come out from the fusion of video game music, notebooks, glitter gel ink pens, 24 hours, and everybody's favorite masquerade holiday.





	1. Day 1: Ring

“What sort of things does it do?”

The grass crinkled at my feet even though I had not moved at all.

A light...

Small as a firefly but as penetrating as the scopes the eye doctor would use on me.

Squinting, I looked to the others. Did they see? Did they also see the bramble, collecting light, see it was the same as that which was below me?

“Well, it’s always hungry,” answered to my friend the boy telling the story. None of them were noticing me. None of them, engrossed in ghost tales, could care if I were to shout at the top of my voice. “It purrs as it gets _really_ hungry, they say. Like a cat in agony.”

Wiggling his fingers, the boy jumped at my friend, my companion who convinced me to join tonight, camp with some new friends. The same friend who told me to pick up that bramble which glowed and was weaved finely into a crown.

Everyone said it was cursed, left on the stump to scare miscreants away, but it wasn’t real, right?

The light was becoming a half moon. A fracture etched under my shoe, crackling wickedly. My icy blood bolted through my toes, though I could not cross the line. Would I fall through? Glitch through? Was I on top of a breaking window pane, or the thinnest plate of ground?

Was I going to fall off the face of the earth?

The storyteller resumed, “But don’t try to shove mean Mr. MacGatchett into its mouth. It hates the obese and the old. It’d barely take a sniff because that’s rancid meat to it.” 

“What does it like?” said the third who was shy up ‘till now. She was fast fading past the sharp glow.

“Sweets. It likes the young, so full of life. All the junk our moms tell us not to have makes us more scrummy.”

A barren heartbeat.

I reached for my company, gandered at the oblivious faces... youthful, like mine. My hand was singed red, the light ringing a single note of threat. I yelped, clutching myself. The half moon was a lollipop with the stick blocking its completion.

Not one of them turned to me.

I cried for help.

They did not turn.

I shrieked at the top of my voice.

They did so little as blink.

Please! Say something! I begged mentally, terror stealing my voice.

The three laughed, but not at me; at the boy’s commentary.

“So you better be careful and don’t touch the cursed bramble like Della did, or you’ll get caught. And we’ll never find out what happened to you.”

“How?”

The ring had completed itself. Nails screeched on the earth-glass. I sunk half an inch.

“It traps you in a ring. Sound-proof. If you were in your mom’s arms, it still could take you, ‘cuz she could never see or hear you bawling. That’s the secret way it gets you, how nobody knows its ugly mug.”

My best friend’s name passed my lips, a desolate plea.

The world shot up. Wind flung my hair up. I was denied the chance to gasp before I landed on something damp.

The moonlight snapped shut.

And then the damp thing reared, wrapped tight around


	2. Day 2: Mindless

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Craig belongs to my friend, TheOtter99 on Tumblr.

Told to stay. Girl knew best. Obey the girl.

“Clementine? Hey, Clementine?”

Clementine’s eyes were glass. Twenty minutes ago, they were green, like the ferns by the side of the road to human civilization.

Twenty minutes ago...

Twenty minutes ago, she was alive. That length of time ago she had color to her skin, not this ashen hue. And that long ago she bled life because of wounds given by a suicide war she declared, fought, and died to in the span of an hour. Her handless stumps, severing her magic, oozed something sickly and grey now that she was hollow.

Her soul had been devoured.

The process was agony, both to the victim and the instigator, and with the gulp of the life force a truly evil spell had been laid over the woman. It was one of soul magic, and it took advantage of her barrenness. Now mindless, she obeyed the spoken order.

Craig continued his frenzied babbling, somewhat to himself, whose ease was fast slipping into a sucking, greedy hole of anxiety, and somewhat to her, an outlet who couldn’t object to his venting in the verbal or the physical.

He wouldn’t catch it until much later, until the witching hour. His pacing would take him beside the gurney and he would spot it that time and do something about it. But in the now, as he rambled, the woman’s pupils shrank. Inward by the tiniest fraction of an inch, something like waking from a dream, or navigating into a more lucid one, happened. 

And in one of Craig’s heartbeats, before she was swallowed by oblivion again, terror reared itself, bit into the soul that was no more.


	3. Day 3: Bait

A cassette recorder, specifically made for the sentimental purposes, has been delivered to the proper home. It plays the message as follows:

Log WJE-076658, date eleven-twenty seven-nineteen. Seems I won’t be home for National Turkey Day. Terribly sorry, Spotty. Your aunt will take good care of you. This is a promise I can keep.

To any human ears, and the finger that pressed the play button, I am required to make a final message to my loved ones as I wait in the dark. Though I have none except for Casey and my co-workers, they say no Christmas bonus if I don’t do this.

So. My buddies know what is to come. I drew the short straw, so it’s my turn.

Who knows when anyone will hear this; the crisis may come to an end when it’s played, or you could be in a worse state than ever. Whichever happens, I need to fill the dead air with something, and I ain’t lived so lonely a life that I’d name off every public works figure to trample my shrubs.

Took a back breaking decade to build this tunnel. Right under the Mojave, build on a daydreamer’s sigh of inspiring the next generation, and what do you know, it comes apart in a month’s time. Worse now that when it was started.

The aim was a subway. One long centipede of steel that would take campers far out, away from the city lights poisoning the sky. The aim was _hope_. If these new adults could see with real eyes and not a danged computer screen what the twilight expanse was really like, there was a held breath that apathy would bury itself, get these people to stand up, save the world.

Shame the diggers dug the wrong way, chipped at the wrong rock.

Something woke. Something truly awful.

And it took with its waking a whole cistern of water waiting to burst. Flooded the tunnel almost instantly, flushing that team with the dream.

It’s no one’s fault, though I cry sometimes for those guys.

This _thing_ had been waiting, wanting to burst.

With the tunnels no good now, we have the underwater cameras and the guards watching out, learning. This thing is as big as our train was going to be, and as vicious as any anxious, cage dwelling carnivore. Even better - take a listen at this - it’s eel shaped, and it lights up like one, too. A supernova couldn’t be brighter.

None of us thought it was so cool when the gamblers in contact with the slot machines fell dead.

It’s smart. Less than a month awake and it figured us out, figured out there was a city and a life force of the twenty-first century pumping through its metal veins. It also figured out the concept of worship and sacrifice, or something primitive to it. It’s why I’m down here, actually.

This guy sure is taking its time. Is it teasing, or being polite to me? Huh.

It knew how to get free meals; all it had to do was zap Las Vegas again. We got the message by then and started a counter to our own offensive. I call it a goober because it doesn’t make sense to me, a layman, but it’s like two magnets facing the wrong way, it pushes the beast’s own power back at itself, knocks it sedated for a vague amount of time.

Still working on that specific number… we can’t afford to keep relying on when the gamblers drop to know.

The catch is, it doesn’t care about a piece of metal and secret inner workings unless something it wants, like a human, is dangling about the water.

I knew my time was coming, don’t worry.

If I can be honest, though, it rubs me the wrong way. This game, people are saying, is a temporary solution to a permanent problem. That’s the defeatist’s code; there’s nothing more shameful to me than giving up so quickly. They hear the world is going to end and they hide under the blankets like children.

I say if it’s going to end X way or Y or Z way, live your life in the time that is left. But do it kicking and screaming, because there is a difference in your home disintegrating and your home disintegrating while you make the smallest action in the face of that. Take me. I might get snatched up with the goober, but I’ve been thinking of how to zap this thing so hard it goes belly up forever.

That’s a lie.

Sorry, terribly sorry.

I want to be the hero, but I’m not much of anything except the worm on the hook. Not able to stop temperature crisis or the trees burning away.

This one thing… being bait? That’s the only noble thing I can do. _Had done_. And it’s about to be over.  
It will end, but the maybe’s in the second question: Maybe I will drop the goober in time? Maybe this recording gets put in a hall of fame for giving back some of the hope I was jabbering about?

Only the gods, wherever they are in the stars, wishing this subway had been a success, know. 

And… I know… if I survive this, I should try harder. Clean up my home a little.

I owe this browning Earth that much. New rose shrubs. An orange tree and some strawberry bushes circling it. Or something indoors and edible for Spotty.

That is that start of something I would kick and scream for.

Something’s moving. 

Need to throw this into the basket now. See you in a few, or never again.


	4. Day 4: Freeze

Always such a proud day when a coming of age happens.

A day of maturity found, of freedom earned, of respect overdue.

For Clementine, it was a day of the sun hiding beneath a sticky grey web of clouds as blood spilled.

Clay did not try to save himself. He hardly got to howl. Letting himself be paralyzed, the fool he was, he was the first meal of a beast escaped from the world of humans.

Clementine watched this happen, stooped, knees locked in collecting berries, staring calmly as through she had never stopped harvesting. Her heart leaped behind gilded bars.

_Always_ such a joyous day.

She couldn’t fight the fear. But her spindly legs trembled in more than that.

A flash, a string of images of the days when she dreaded coming back, or when she tasted mud or felt her ears go hot red because of the names hissed into them.

The pale leopard had set her free.

It minded a scrawny girl not at all because the robust, unaware prize was the more savory.

And when it finished, turning to her, when fate saw fit for its claws to take out not her eye but the skin under her eye, when that broke the spell and she was aware it was kill or die, she lashed out. She did not earn such a gift for it to be taken away, and so her soul melted the terror.

Acting like a puppeteer over all, she made it dance. She made it obey her will to hurt itself. The surging of its blood and her blood was fire and gold and icicles and breathless power. Yes, power… something had been found… born out of her refusal to die like her rat of a brother had. And she would wield it to bury this enemy, and all enemies who would come after.

She would not freeze again.

Always such a victorious day when a spirit of the shadow makes her first kill, when she drags it into her home - stirring the spirits around her like a nest of wasps - when she skins and wears it like a coat of glory.

The coming of age yields from such a monster in the making a moment of gilded bravery.


	5. Day 5: Build

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one’s a little heavy on the edge/dark themes (specifically implied torture), so if you're uncomfortable by that kind of stuff, I recommend you skip this day.

She woke in the gloom. No chains this time. Unrestrained by any method, actually, she looked around.

A stone slab under herself, acting as a bed, a lantern and three blue fireflies by her feet, emitting the subdued lights, vines on the pale wall. Water dripped somewhere, tempo of a ticking clock. She could not see the corners or the front facing wall.

“I know you’re here,” she called. Her voice did not reach far; it bounced back at her. The quaver gave away the deception of her words. Yes, she knew it was here, but that only made her know that the stability, specifically the serenity in not being cut into or used as a makeshift pincushion, was limited.

When it came was the unspoken question. 

“Well? Get on with it!”

The dripping continued.

Her outfit was clean. Clean-_ish._ Same dust bunnies clinging like children to her pant legs. Did Allure see her that way? She felt small as one when he would rock her, hum to her. Was it pathetic she needed such an infantile comfort for a terror not unlike the monster hiding under the bed? Did he think it was?

The vines rustled.

Delli’s pulse stopped. She became one with the slab. Without anything holding her down, slipping off the stone and looking for away out tempted her - but not anymore.

Why was it doing this, not having her pinned, not getting on with whatever harm it meant for her? She felt whole… was it already over, and she simply was numb?

No, she could feel the faint coursing of blood through her veins. And even if she was, the last few times negated that. It loved her screams like sweet juices.

Was the ticking - dripping, it was dripping - was it getting faster? The seconds sifted away. It had to be looming, spying for some new fear the subconscious had yet to reveal. Some new toy for it to exploit.

“What’s the point of this?” she demanded.

Though nothing gave, a sticky heat passed over her.

“Stop it! I- I want to go home-”

A shrill something like a record scratch pierced through Delli’s cry. But airy, raspy, too, and it skipped over itself at a faster tempo than the water drops.

“Are you laughing? Why?”

Skittering through the vines, claws touched her cheek, a lover’s peck in form of a pinch. She shrieked, cursed the thing she couldn’t see. Hugging herself tightly, knees drawn to her chin, she said, hissing, “He’ll eat you alive. Once Allure knows what you are he is going to kill you.”

The laugh came again, right by her ear, and she responded with a closed fist to something sensitive and crunchy, if the bug-like squeal gave any hint.

Her win was so small, brief, that she didn’t see the pincers in time. They snapped on her arm and something deep cracked.

She went blind, screaming into her knees. Stingy tears made the walls blur.

“Please,” she wheezed. “I want… Allure. I want to go back, be safe. I want my…”

Cackling a third time, so joyful at itself, at a silly girl’s words (they felt silly now, calling for a person who could not, would not, come), and touched her forehead.

She flinched, expecting a cut, but what came was worse.

Another Allure, a sickeningly grinning fox thing that also tortured, also killed with little restraint. Who also murdered another Delli who was not unlike herself. This person’s last moments played out the Other Allure made a gaping hole appear in her torso, and her Other self collapsing into ash.

A monster. Exactly like the ones who would hide in the dark and build a victim’s fears, who would build up distrust in someone she might have called a familial name.

Was it working?

Delli wouldn’t have time to decide here and now; the thing got bored of teasing and came upon her, smashing out the light.


	6. Day 6: Husky

In a child in a box in an alley, a dream stirred.

Unpleasant dreams, dreams of a life lost and faces evaporated in the mist.

Little girl of six murmuring, she called names she forgot, cold sweat on her brow.

Above, dying Christmas lights blinked, weak to stop night terrors.

In a throat in a creature in an alley, a growl rose.

Unpleasant of a growl, yet cut short to see not danger but lack of comfort.

Little whimper of the husky, it climbed into the box and licked her cheek, drying her tears.

Above, blue dream stars twinkled, strong to stay the hope through the night.


	7. Day 7: Enchanted

They walked hand in hand, water splashing under their shoes, on the chilliest rainy day of October. The clouds sprinkled, a pleasant rainfall that glittered their hair, fogged their surroundings. Who knew where they were going? That was the adventure, the mystery. The woman insisted it made their date all that more enchanted.

There would be no wild adventures today, they agreed. His grip a squeeze, thumb running over her knuckle, the man breathed the damp air, strode at a pace that his woman controlled.

Oh, she could be so controlling, but charmingly so. He could get her to compromise if it was a must.

Once upon a time, they were children in love, taking their steps through a similar forest in a home far away and nearly forgotten. Today they were well-grown, past the ways of the child. But yet not above them. Even now she’d break the glass-like surface of puddles, dampening her pants. And he, in his own silly habit, would turn pink for every stolen kiss lighting his soul.

The past, the circumstances, they had robbed the two long ago. A future in a mortal Earth was left in the ash, and not so distant ago they would have forgotten each other’s names.

She truly forgave him. And he her. Always, they promised, they would fight for each other. Brave soldiers on the front lines gave their lives away for better homes, to sustain their homes; they saw each other as home.

In a twilight growing darker, words were exchanged. Questions, secrets… apologies. They’d said sorry before, insisted the time for blame had gone and that all that was left was forgiveness, but the pain would never quite dissipate. They would always have regrets; youth bred folly, simply because neither knew any better. The wrong voices lulled them into the wrong graces.

Once upon a time, they got older. They got wiser, too, and were able to look back with new eyes all that they missed.

Never again.

The woman loved too much to repeat the emotional violence she caused her dearest friend. And, she considered, he would say the exact same.

Now?

They found a clearing, a cliff - a nudge of her boot sent a dozen pebbles scattering into oblivion. They perched on the edge. A romantic place to ask a simple, audacious question.

She wanted to. Her heart tugged at her fingers, brought them to her breast pocket. The words scaled her throat, aching to burst the silence, fill her dearest friend with the best kind of joy.

Said wisdom which had been reflected on not minutes ago, Not yet.

Impulse had been her sister for all her life, it was hard to ignore it. Her sister, her friend, her guide… and her foe.

Her hand left the little square box.

Not yet, she agreed. Almost there… but not yet. Just a little longer.

What was just a little longer, asked the man. 

She shook her head, silenced the doubt with a strawberry kiss.


	8. Day 8: Frail

He blew his chance.

He blew it a long time ago.

It was not too late for the others.

He would have liked to believe so.

A Dreamer with a farm, a sister; a Sleuth with an open door to escape; a Firebrand who could pick up the pieces, live as those who had gone would have wanted her to.

And so on… if mercy really existed.

For himself, he suspected it did not. Having lived poorly, he would have done anything to kill the man of frail mind and take his place. But wishes were dangerous. He came to know this through the broad road, riddled with biting thorns and cruel ghosts.

He did like to think, for now until his purpose was fulfilled, that he could live up to his own title. Like Lancelot and Link, like Sir Peter of Narnia and the lord Aragorn of Middle-Earth, he could live up to being the Stalwart.

Vincent had led them this far; if he could help, pull the rest over the finish line, that would be enough.

And…

And if she were listening somewhere, in a better place or that place in between asleep and awake, where her consciousness could brush against an inkling that he missed her, loved her, he would have liked to tell her.

Maybe a goodbye. A proper one. That’s what he could hope for without making a wish.


	9. Day 9: Swing

The bat was borrowed from a friend. I made an oath it would be returned at nine forty-five sharp, right before my own curfew.

And I did not lie about its purposes. Therapy, I said, and dashed away.

Do you know of the abandoned bookshop, a step away from the pier? Glass bottles hung overhead for the aesthetic and a splendid view of the river as children would whisk to their lands of escape.

Too bad nothing is more a dream killer than one of those bottles clunking a teen into a concussion. It swiped the place clean over the course of lawsuits and hateful phone calls, and, the dying wheeze, an idiot tossing a cocktail down the vents and lighting it up like a jack-o-lantern.

Some of the books somehow were preserved, but the bottles were left behind. Too smoky? Not worth trying to recycle? Fine by me. I was depending crucially on this factor.

My weapon is durable. Nice, chilling steel, hard as a bone. Made for destruction.

The first swing, specifically tossing it through the front window, made a delicious crackling, fireworks of glass. The sandy shards made a white crunchy carpet to step in on.

Next? One of the hanging wine bottles, strung up like strangled pigs? The cocktail glasses, left upside down after one last drink (not very smart to drink out of any container left in a chemical fire)?

I swipe up my bat, shut my eyes, and let my elbows do the driving.

None of the alarms go off. Strange if they should, but no one’s around to tattle on some punk kid looking to relieve pressure.

And if they are and they do, at least something will happen.

Level one, cleared. Level two, start. The bat comes down once more, a rotted bookshelf my victim. Cockroaches flee from this god’s wrath, but like a god I smite them just like how I wish I could smite the days.

One

by

one.

Monday, dead. Tuesday, beaten to mush. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, clubbed, battered, annihilated. Saturday and Sunday, squashed and splintered. If nothing could remain, that’s fine of a balm to the joy of being my character.

When I am done, or at least panting too hard to continue, splinters stick in my jeans, prickle my hair. I must look like an insane cactus monster, something any anime antihero would be thrilled to fight on top of Kilimanjaro.

A crowd has gathered outside - a small one at that, some parents and their buggy-eyed kiddos. Stepping through my makeshift doorway, I shake the wood and glass from the creases of my soles and sneer, blowing a loud raspberry, and run off.

Let them call the authorities.

At least something would happen to me that would break the sameness that is being my character.


	10. Day 10: Pattern

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a follow-up to Day 9: Swing, and can be found in this story. This can also be read on its own.

The days never change.

Monday, sameness. Tuesday, boredom. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, repeats, cycles, heartbeats. Saturday and Sunday, dullness and drabness.

I live through the same seven, and little ever changes.

I say it ironically that I live every boy’s dream, living in a video game. I am the avatar, and my week is the story package within. When the credits roll, when my eyes close Sunday night, the tale is complete. The “player” deletes my file, and ‘round we start over again.

Same things.

Same events at the same set times.

Only difference is _sometimes_ I get a number, an event associated with that number, and _something_ actually happens.

Sometimes it is I find a package of Oreos brought just for me. Sometimes it is I work up the courage to ask for a ride, as the burden I sometimes think I am, so I can buy myself the game I’ve ached for months to play.

And then there is the FUN event in which Father hits a deer dead on, knocking us down a car so we have to hail taxis to our sleepy nowhere town, and discouraging little me into staying inside my four walls.

Nothing has changed since a lot of things.

Since my best friend went away, a new misfortune lengthening the time ‘till he could come home.

Since the car accident (though no one human was hurt).

Since I’d started seeing my own bedroom, once sanctuary, as a television screen, and the outdoors as the zeros and ones the avatar isn’t s‘posed to see.

I’m trapped.

And not a glance nor an angry call to the authorities coming my way has happened; my vandalism didn’t work.

Selfish. I know.

A few hundred dollars to bust me out is not what my parents need in this morose chapter. I should be grateful no one cared.

But I do.

And I am begging, crying out to a universe that does not to tell me when life moves on.

When will I shatter the only glass that mattered?

When will I bust free, crawl out with the cuts, the proof that I fought for something worthwhile?

But I fall asleep before I hear an answer.

The End.

Roll credits.

Delete?

Insert name.

Begin.


	11. Day 14: Overgrown

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Days 11, 12, 13, and 15 were skipped because of a lack of inspiration, and real life causing me to lag behind. Also, major spoilers ahead.

Here in the garden, **we**<strike>’ll</strike> **played a game.**

The pieces we<strike>a</strike>re set. **against me.**

The sound of our laughter **Only I am not laughing**

will fill this home for countless years.

It will end when I come back **You never did.**

and then you win. **But I lost.**

In a few moments **In a few millennia**

When the sky is full **When the garden is empty**

We’ll look back on all the good times we had. **You will smile sweetly on the trick you played.**

I’ll come right back **You’ll never come back.**

And we will have good fun again. **No more fun to come.**

Let us start. **I don’t want to play anymore.**

**Are you pleased?**

**Are you laughing?**

**Do your witchy cackles fill the dead air?**

**I should be proud of you.**

**You did it without batting an eyelash.**

**And where am I now?**

**Am I to stay? Am I to pretend you were my friend?**

**Because I would be lying to myself.**

**Something’s encroached. Like the vines that strapped my feet still, something new has grown in. It fills me and fills and fills me, shattering my body, turning my world upside down that I feel nothing else but this.**

**I have outgrown you.**

**I have become overgrown.**

**So.**

**Since you obviously have other friends to play with now.**

**How would you feel if I broke a toy of yours?**


	12. Day 16: Wild

The era of disarray started with a checker patterned picnic sheet, a pair of glasses, and a lake in which the predator waded in wait.

A perfectly sunny day, crisp with autumn air, the old man had foolishly left the picnic basket open; sandwiches and tiny cakes peeked out.

What a treasure trove!

A look to the left, and a look to the right. And the piercing war cry that this village would soon know. Water dribbled from sticky, white feathers that ruffled. It buried its head into the basket and chowed.

Of course the feller came back. And what an ire he was in. The broom was not very effective, and a hiss and a clamp of the bill sent the weasel away.

Chasing, it bit empty air, closer, closer to the bum. Its prey whimpered, cried to his neighbors for salvation. God is deaf, and doth not save from the beast of the lake.

A circle around, a bellow from its tiny lungs, and the prey fell like a sack, cowering, and his spectacles flew away. These the creature pushed onto its bill; a merry trophy for this day.

The man tried to steal back his belonging. But watery and poor his sight was, and so not hardly close was the grasp that would throttle his enemy. The third time went the beastly honk, and he wimped out, fled, scampered, tripped. The lake’s maw was open in welcome, common cold-inducing embrace.

And so began the wild escapades of a common animal, the stinky devil bastard of the village. Trouble would be found. But if found not, created.


	13. Day 17: Ornament

The king sat his prized gem in the cradle before the three mirrors. Routine of the morning, he withdrew the brushes, the powders, the gloss, and held her face firm and selected his first tool.

Once, long ago, to make her pretty for a daily constitutional among the people.

Today, to make her ravishing before her groom.

Three princesses of milky eyes watched herself and her father as she was dressed up in white, skin and clothes. Not one pore was missed. The hand that handled the brush was thorough, steady, a thousand and one times painting her giving the needed experience. She was in good hands.

“Chin up,” he ordered.

She obeyed. Sticky substance was smeared under, down her neck, so that the unblemished skin was one mask of the full body. Her father murmured his thanks.

Not too long now. The happily ever after would be secured. Not too long from now, and Wilhelm would belong to her. Only her. The fairest arrangement for…

No, no, that was the nightmare. That was the cold feet kicking in, trying to scare her out of getting married. Wilhelm would never.

Just a nightmare, little princess of joy. She deserved this, not that phantom.

Her father gently ordering her to, she puckered her lips and a damp cotton wad pat them red, made them bloody. The only color on this face. Not counting the antlered diamond atop her head or the winged one over her bosoms.

The king said with a rasp, “Perfection.” His porcelain princess complete, all dressed, pleasing to look at, she would be a fine ornament to the future king.

Was she being asked if she were pleased? No such point to have three that stared back if she were not. Yet she did not care to know. Her throat was lazy, as though it alone were bored of raising questions at all.

There would be a time for babble, maybe later, such as when she was to give her vows.

But, even then, why would she? The happiest day of her life awaited, and in helping it move along it would end too soon.

No.

Forever.

She wanted forever. Princess of pure light, life, love, deserved not to say a word and so strike an end to her storybook dream.

She accepted her father’s hand and walked beneath the arch of the four-pointed stars that, through every night, watched over her from infant to child to adolescent to adult today. Now they would see her through.

To the church. To the happy ending. To blissful oblivion.

Sleep on, my radiant beauty, and seal the tombs of the soon-to-be sleepers.


	14. Day 19: Sling

Do you remember when we met? We were children, following our respective parents like lost sheep.

While I cannot say for you, for me the memory was impeccable: the bank, crowded and poor in lighting, felt like a barn. The carpet was this sickly brown that might have been a daisy yellow when first laid out. The clock above the teller’s booth was greased over, didn’t tick.

I think it was easy to remember all of this because I wanted to be absentminded, or rather, to think of anything that had nothing to do with my arm.

I had been climbing, or I was running, or doing something so reckless that my mother’s sheep-like scolding lingered in memory, too. Not the actual accident - I think trauma blotted that - but it was bad enough that she was irate.

That hurt me nearly as terrible as the fracture. I had disappointed her beyond redemption, it felt like. I was baggage that day, too inconvenient to take home to four other sisters the same age as me while there were too many things for the parents to do. We were off to the bank as soon as my arm was put in that sling.

I would like to think it was a trigger.

I was a brave girl. I feared little. But any kind of severe pain would make a child sob. Some silly goose of a banker dropped his money bags, distracted, bursting the burlap like balloons and spilling the coins like a waterfall. I think that sight would have stuck to your memory.

But anyway, the cacophony unfolded, a heaviness came at the back of my head, and there you were. Three feet distant, a newsboy watching in silence the girl with the port wine stains and her arm in a sling. You must have gone into a daze, because you blushed as terribly as I when you realized I was watching back.

Something round was rolling between your fingers. My imagination wild, I thought it was a magic bean, or a glass eye stolen off of a pirate, or something as precious.

The line had moved forward for me, so I was dragged away. But you broke from yours and pressed the round thing into my hand, helped me open it to reveal a candy, and returned to your place.

It must have been so wonderful to defy my mother over when she ordered me to throw it away. You were wonderful, too. Your shell cracked for long enough to give a crying girl a candy. I wish the time had allowed a proper thank you, or the exchange of names.

What might have happened if we grew up knowing each other? Would we have made the same mistakes, or would years rather than months of a bond meld in the needed strength to withstand fate’s harsh arrows?

I would like to think my nature wound us together. I was the ‘wild child Evalyn Marie’; of course I was doing something stupid that make my arm break. I was the defiant wolf through and through. My spirit - wild, passionate, craving freedom - was what made us meet and made us break.

But I want to say no more.

Mistakes were made between our first relationship and now, but never do I regret reuniting with that flustered boy who would come to understand my plight, nor again with the man who would become my best friend. Do you feel that way, too? And, if allowed, would you want to live anew to know me again, just as I would want to live anew and know you again?

Not that you can exactly answer. I’m speaking to a napkin while you’re across the room with your daughters, having a good time. I have permission from myself to be sappy.

Still, I do hope you feel something similar to what “told” “you”. Maybe later I will summon the courage to ask the question that truly matters.


	15. Day 20: Tread

I’ve tread these roads for a thousand days, the same stretch of asphalt unwinding on, with a few nowhere towns on the way to infinity. And the name changed each time, I am forgotten almost as soon as I am known.

In my endless escape the sun baked my skin brown, made my hands rough. The hard work was good, let me live inside my head for as much as I liked.

No standards, no expectations.

No rejection.

I had never needed anyone to respect me or to love me because I have always respected and loved me. My heartbeat and my breath as my guiding stars, I learned well to be a lone wolf.

Until you.

Until my guiding stars took human faces of a cozy glow, I had been convinced not one person would want to know me. But something changed. Something was inflicted that made me feel I could be honest with someone other than myself.

That I could trust in someone other than myself.

I’ve walked these roads with as little on my person as a soda can of dollar bills, worn the treads of my shoes to wafers. All of me screams that I have made do on my own, that this will be the same, hopeless story, but the resistance saps. If I turn out to be wrong, I want it to hurt this time.

So until then, let me fall in faith.

Let me fall in faith that I have found home.


	16. Day 21: Treasure

“’Never a stranger world,‘ said the rider of beasts, agreeing. ‘Never a stranger world.’“

Next page to flyleaf.

Flyleaf.

Flyleaf.

Back cover.

The Keeper of the library closed the book, returned it to its place among the science fiction. A cabinet more than a bookshelf, lots of figurines to fill empty space for titles yet to find home. Regardless, loved and welcome to fill one’s head with new lives. The Keeper wandered away, searching anew.

She was, by the literal definition, a dragon: tall, scaly, and given long, curved horns and wide, leather wings, and a tail that dragged behind. Unlike most, she was bipedal by choice, and her hoard did not glitter nor would fetch to her home many thieves (though if a jewel like a ruby or amethyst wound up here, it would make for a convenient bookend). Her lilac scales reflected back the words compiled in the bundles of paper and leather which she preferred as her great treasures.

The dizzying distance of shelves before her, she let her heartbeat lead her to the next adventure.

A tale of candlelight combatting the darkness while survivors clawed for great hopes? What of a silly story, whimsy and laughter drumming along to a cavorting party?

Her heart trilled at that. Fluff was good; smiles revived was a good way to conclude a wild, windy day. To the “children’s” section - no word except by social standards, and stupid ones at that, ever forbade a grown person from reading made for the youth - she turned. These fine shelves were stacked higher, dense as a wall.

The Keeper’s steps clacked like marbles. Her tail swished with interest at all the potential reads crooning for attention; and occasionally the tuft attacked the dust bunnies, wherever they most obnoxiously greyed her books.

Filled with a wonderful heaviness, she let go of a pent breath. The story she’ d finished was spinning round still, its men and aliens alive to her. That title’s pages were crinkled from previous abuse, silky with age under her ownership, and quite a few of them threatened to dislodge if ever turned too recklessly.

The last hundred she drank in in one sitting, so a slight headache was there - but a _good_ headache.

She sometimes let herself think that the more frequently she read one story, the faster the heroes and innocents could find their joyous conclusion. And, she added now, the faster the antagonists met their fates, for stolen life or gruesome, fitting end.

Of course, those sorts of characters wouldn’t be so happy to know what awaited before the flyleaf. Knowledge was damning.

No, divine knowledge. Self correction. Knowledge in general was good.

Heroes wouldn’t like to know, either. Most stories needed grief to build up to victory, and to know what kind of grief was ahead meant a heart filled with dread.

The Keeper halted to further consider without crashing into things. If evil or good, either, knew their futures, then they would drastically be changed, and then there would be no story at all. Only a series of spiraling events that would end in a predictable, and despondent, manner.

And, really, why would the book containing these words exist at all if they spiraled, turned to jumbled nonsense that began because the characters learned they were characters-

Whoawhoawhoa.

That got a little weird there. It was way too soon after one read to go diving into something this… much. Too many thoughts. Save the existential philosophy for Thursday.

Thursday seemed right for it. A day of the school week that hardly had much going on, so that could fill the emptiness that day.

That decided, she resumed her walk. And, battling some indecisiveness between the same six titles she’d paused at, she picked one out and made her way back to her nest.

Winds turned to thunder, and before the Keeper had settled on the lofty pile of blankets, pillows, and animal plushies, pattering sounded on the outside.

She smiled, and one spear-like claw lifted the title page. Listening to the rain while reading was a rare pleasure.

While easy on its own, there was something enchanted about the drumming of the rain sealing the boundary between worlds. It was a joy to find, having help in leaving your world behind.


	17. Day 22: Ghost

My life had ended the moment a man whom I thought to be my truest, only friend was also cut down.

And I catch myself laughing at that nowadays.

My life as something mortal had been pathetic. The cockroach who doesn’t know she is a cockroach take delight licking the boots of those who provide. As savior and friend, or murderer and manipulator, I had been mindless to not know there ever was a question.

These things I came to know at the foot of the grave I had dug for the man I worshipped, thought respected me back. No part of me flesh, I had no tears to weep, yet I cried. No brain to project emotions, I hated and mourned with the proverbial heart.

I’d been raised under a bitter brother. He told me things that, over time, I began to believe. Being so young when I first heard them, I unconsciously took them in as truth. And when I did something impressive, something that stirred the bees that were my people and attracted a leader not with pride but lust for power, I thought I had conquered these beastly doubts.

I was wrong.

They were patient. As though they, like my brother beyond the realm of the living, were lingering ghosts, came down on me to haunt and torment, a thousand times paid back for the pain I had inflicted on others.

And now I’m trapped.

My body was… well, I won’t grace these thoughts with its specific end. The elaboration only needs that it’s gone. And I am _this._

A ghost. A soul taken shape of what my body and clothes used to be.

And as far as I can see, the second death, the one where this soul ages too much and decides to go away, that is not to be.

No flesh to decay. No brain to rot, melt, dribble out of my ears.

And surrounded by the people I maimed, the target grows until I could swear I feel it weight on my spirit shoulders.

For though age can’t take me, I can hurt.

Fortune’s arrows and slings take favoritism to the beasts of the woods, and certainly they would like a fine kill at the flitting contradiction, who can pass through walls yet cripple at the blow of a weapon.

I would dread this for the next time I am attacked, but…

my mourning has ended, like it or not. If I am to continue existing when all logic says I should have dissipated into cosmic dust - less than that - I must survive.

No human, animal, monster, spirit, yes, even doubtful and whisper, god, ghost, none of these come to a life that has no room for them.

I must believe in this. Nothing I did up to now had left a lasting satisfaction that I lived to the fullest. I must have something to hold onto, or else a million possibilities will doubtlessly shatter the heart of the one whom I want with all of me to believe tolerates or even appreciates me.

I must find what I really am here for.

And if it takes until an ending of the known universe to find out, may it be.

That is the sole advantage I have over who I’ve been. That woman fixed herself in deluded fantasy derived of desperation to be wanted.  
I… suppose she, as I, still am. _Is._

But this is what eternity is for, right?

Don’t I have all the time I want?

Can I trust that this one person isn’t playing with me, that he really does want me for who or whatever I am now?

This thing I have come to know: whoever she is, the person I am hates who I have been.


	18. Day 23: Ancient

They found the walls of the deep oak woods during the hiding times, when the sun was out and strength was waning. Weary they looked, a long trek made, and grateful for a mystical shelter.

Like ants, they scurried. An exploration of the tabby ruins showed them slivers of past lives. Three lines on the ground, the fourth missing, as where royals and lords used to dine. And an alcove where princesses-to-be tormented begrudging princes with their games. A formation of three walls and a ceiling joined with the start of a cliff wall, and overgrown over and back with fig creepers, where the mystery teased the most.

So many questions spun on what could have happened. The youngest of them all was brimming, spilling over with the most imaginative theories, deceptively intelligent.

The stream ran down the cliff face, over the strange cube structure, and dribbled into a sunken well, and so, thirst quenched, tales were invented on the fly as possible answers. They did so until the searing light went away.

Was the land a war site? A wedding scenery? Were kings born and slain here, and given cursed rings to gain dominion over all men and beasts, only for that power to turn on themselves?

To some of these, yes. To others, not even close - these poor souls, they watched a little too much tv.

There were less serious explanations, jokes more than anything to humor. Like the one of the winged turtles and dinosaurs who combated against men who wore red and jumped through sewage pipes, or of lady knights against brain eaters and pterodactyl pirates.

They were good stories. And such youthful, delicious faces contorted in humor. Harsh wind joined with raspy breath that the grownup mistook for ravens.

Now as the moon came out of her cloudy bed and each of the children yawned, strength renewed. It could have been easy to snatch each of them away, bring them to the house that they thought was a cube conjoined to the cliff.

But… they amused it, too. Not many good storytellers these days, so this was a rare gift.

Not this time. It was hungry, but not this time.

The troupe would sleep on in peace, and then return to their boring lives, never to discover the wicked secrets of these ancient ruins.


	19. Day 24: Dizzy

The time was eleven fifty-eight on a September night when the windows had frosted over. Dead branches like fingernails battered the panes.

The doctor removed the syringe, and at once heat invaded. Through his veins, into his gullet, all around his hammering heart as he stood tall, felt tall. So much of him was there. Joy and fear, rage and triumph, it all collided in such a small head.

He was dizzy. While London slept he had entered the evolution into savior, hard work like the elves of the shoe shop granting at last his rich rewards. The room twirled, playing to the melody he heard.

Emma… she could rest in his embrace, knowing she was his, all in. No more delays to nurturing their love. And no more late nights, prioritizing work over wife-to-be. All that was needed was the proof, that his experiment had worked, that his chemicals could save. The sun would rise brilliant this morning. The doubters, he would spit back into their faces so they could see for themselves.

Icarus could only wish to have flown as close as he.

His stomach roiled. The uneasy heat crackled to glass, and he gave a terrible cry, dropping to his side.

Something had turned wrong. His bones were encased in fire, ice, it crawled through his whole skeleton, tore at the heart it was once gentle around. Was the linoleum always so… spotty?

He was himself no more, but a golem of convulsion. Hell’s gates parted before his eyes, and the faces of those who’d counted on him, they turned away.

How?

It was _flawless._ He couldn’t have failed, not now.

Flawless it was. It was freeing him.

He was dying.

He was living.

He was screaming.

He was cackling.

He had lost.

He had won.

And, with a final snap, the dividing wall crumbled to ashes.

And Doctor Henry Jekyll was put away into the alcove of the human soul; the abused toy to be taken out once more, only when he would be needed to suffer again.

And awake came Edward Hyde.


	20. Day 25: Tasty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Featuring TheOtter99's character, Craig!

Well, the kitchen exploded. So hecking much for pie and marshmallows night.

While Cat Man glares at my hazardous attempt and tries to do cleanup, I am taken outside. I blink violently, my good eye weeping.

“Whoa, um… here… I gotcha, Delli…”

Shapes swim, blurry, toward my face and wipe the tears away. Craig’s worried expression comes out clear; heat prickles through my veins.

“You good?” he asks, and cups my face.

The heat coils around my heart. Comfort like a fluffy hug protecting it from the rain clouds fills me to the lungs.

I say, “Yeah. I’m good.” And I pull him in for a kiss. As constant as the glittering black stars, he is warmth, he is joy, and really anything and everything I could love about him.

I may be nothing like Dove - that is, she may make her fancy art out of food while strawberry jam splatters across every surface in my wake - but I don’t need to be her. I am me.

And me happens to be the one with a best friend who loves me for all in all.

Craig melts into the kiss, and his hands find their way to my neck. Sinking into each other, a gust teasing our hair, we are haunted by the taste of strawberries through the remainder of our night.


	21. Day 26: Dark

These things are true: the world has gone dark, the sun swallowed by God knows what; I have been put in the attic, left to choke on the cobwebs; and I am alone, and They are coming.

It’s been four hours since I was put away. Others were supposed to be with me, but no one ever came. The storm hasn’t stopped, and the wind keeps tangling with the loose shutter. I could unhook it, but that means seeing outside, what has really happened.

It’s too loud.

It’s too quiet.

One teeter or the other! Shut up, or give me more noise.

Close to me, discernable in what remains of my phone’s backlight, are the spiders who make their home a breath’s length above. The moths, too - silly that it’s now when I fear not these.

And a stuffed rabbit. Bipedal, but legless, the last memento, the thing I could snatch before being boxed away. Its black eyes stare into mine, naïve and cuddly like nothing’s wrong.

I was giddy seven hours ago, playing a game with other children. Where has everyone gone now? What makes me alone, still alone?

My answer is about to come. The hatch is jiggling, the deadbolt holding it shut. Voices gather underneath, and an axe splinters through the wafer planks, wrenching a scream free.

They, or someone like They, have come.


	22. Day 29: Injured

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a follow-up to Day 5: Build. And because of that, this also involves implied torture (though to much less of an extent) and other possibly triggering subject matter. Read with caution or skip this one.

The pain came out snarling, reawakened. Her shoulder blades, her arms, the top of her head, the small of her back… it was a constant throbbing of jabbing pins, like the blood was exerting itself far more than it should have, simply to course through.

Nearby, Vesper mewled. They had seen everything, didn’t they? And now they were mewing in her face, Delli having been left to sprawl like a sack of potatoes, cold nose touching hers.

The ice of their eyes brought something back.

Green…

A lightning bolt that crashed against a sicky sky. It was a jagged shape, like a skeletal arm grasping her shoulder.

Except the hand - or something in the same function as one - was real.

Delli sneezed into her elbow. Her clothes were soaked through; must have brought a mess back with her.

In no direction could she see beyond the curtain, and she definitely did not want to look over herself. The abomination knew this, for it laughed - queasily and whirring and scratchy like a record’s halt, and by no means inviting - and did its work at harming her. The same game it had rigged for her to lose over and again.

Run from it, take jabs at it, or hide away until it possibly grew bored… there were no scales to tip her way. No justice between a monster and its plaything, and sanctuary had failed. It _liked_ when Delli tried to rely on either.

Its nimble fingers had toiled in the slippery cold.

Poking, sewing, threading.

She _had_ become a plaything; she shut her eyes, refused to look at how she had been dressed up.

As present as the tingling throb where she most had been stuck that _thing_ stayed, haunting.

Why wouldn’t it go away? What did she do that made it want _her_? 

Why couldn’t…

…be free?

The breath slipped out, chilly as herself, and she fell away.

She woke again to something tugging at her arm. Squeaking, she clenched, waiting for the shrill laughter. 

All she got was Vesper’s meow, low and whimpering like an apology.

Still on the floor. Still home. She uncoiled, and Vesper clambered onto her shoulder, gnawing as the tugging resumed.

She stayed still as she could for them, trying to relax. Her heart wouldn’t allow it, but it was worth the attempt. Nobody else around to witness her misery… Allure must have been looking after Margaret and Clover.

Those two… it didn’t come for them, did it? Outside, the street was as empty as ever. No, if something had happened, Allure would have torn the pavement, literal hell broken in his wake.

Though Vesper was being gentle, they aggravated the sore spots still, and always with another kitten’s whimper if Delli hissed too loud. One by one, things fell away, and the blood marched on, unblocked. Again, Delli dared not to look. She only listened to Vesper’s teeth clamping as they worked, plucking at the seams.

Less than a month she had known the amalgamation who had hatched for her out of anyone else here, yet they stuck as close to her as something she had seen only in a glimpse in her travels: a woman holding the hand of a kid as they, together, skipped along.

Was that what she was? She felt that way in the kid’s position when it came to Allure - deceitful visions notwithstanding - so it couldn’t have been wholly outlandish to take the other role…

Vesper barked, hopping off her back and wolf tail swishing.

“Th… thanks, kiddo,” she said. Another sneeze followed, and she shivered. It was almost shocking how fast such a tiny creature could whip a blanket over her. They nestled in the crook of her arm, and Delli herself buried her head in the fluffy material and held her dear friend close.

The floor was hard, but pleasant for the moment. A clock somewhere ticked, ticked away the seconds of respite.


	23. Day 30: Catch

A good dad spends the morning catching his kids. It’s a sunny, red day outside, and the black stars glitter, pieces of heaven witnessing a moment of familial joy.

Four good children flock to their father; three, in a literal way through the wings on their backs. Each he tosses to the air, trusting himself. And each time he is not betrayed, but rewarded with bubbles of their laughter.

Watching over the five, her own darlings scampering around her feet, a woman hums and plucks harp strings, making a melody out of her dissonant chuckles. Her hair coarse, puffy, from a long shower, she breathes the nip in the air, laughs as her youngest tugs at her hem for attention, which she obliges.

It is a rare day. Serenity, hope, dullness, even, it’s all here. Try as she could, the very last day she had any of it had sloped through the hourglass, buried under too many other days gone by that the example has gone through memory’s door.

Soon, it will become boring. And soon the familiar itch will rear, and she would risk everything to act like a wild girl. Again.

All to play games with herself, to avoid sameness.

But…

He was here. And so were they.

And she was here. And so were they.

She - and he - had set to not let such a thing come to be. A family was theirs now. And though like an Edward Hyde in their Henry Jekylls temptations were abound and would rise again, they had more than themselves to be tethered to the straight and narrow.

Their children, their new chapters, each other - they were all relying on everything to stay. That alone was motivation enough to keep strong. But if ever one or the other tripped, those open arms would not hesitate to catch them.

Arrogant as it may have been, the woman vowed that never, for the rest of eternity, would anyone have to do this, for she would not let herself fall.

And she was certain her love, whose smile as he tossed his youngest airborne rubbed up to her heart like an elegant feline, was promising exactly the same.


	24. Day 31: Ripe

It was time to harvest.

Overhead, like Christmas lights, like fireflies, like stars, the pumpkin-shaped fruits dangled, their thick vines running, up, up, up farther than the shroud of shadows gulping the home cave in twilight could show.

The aurora borealis could long to be so vibrant as these. Proof of a test passed well in this dragon’s eyes.

A few did fall by the wayside as a cost. Eleven, twelve, thirteen, all unseen because time ran short, and she had needed to go on for the others. Fifteen came out rancid under the shiny facade, a product of impulsive haste, and so was disregarded. Eighteen, it wasn’t coming out right, and twenty-seven and twenty-eight, no inspiration could have come in time to nurse those. But all in all, twenty-three treasures made ripe through the plucking of the heartstrings and the aches of the fingers and wrists - a twenty-fourth being forged with the flames of the Muse.

A voice called, “Sister?” and another dragon, reasonably stressed for a holiday, entered the scene.

“I see you’ve finished.” A new orb, red as a ruby, came down between the sisters, putting the two into a brighter sunset. “Good job, Spire. Ah, we do need a break now that we’ve finished.”

Spire smiled too widely; that was good, because she wasn’t fretting over the way her dimples swelled if she were that joyful. “Yeah! It was fun, but too much stress to do again anytime soon. I’d rather narrate for a while, Intern. Or read. Both, really,” she added, rubbing a stiff shoulder.

Intern made an assenting motion with her claws. Plucking Number Seven in between two, she took them over to a wooden chest, layered with blankets. “Our test went well. Seems our most honest self springs out on paper, certainly when there is no backspace to abuse.”

“It makes us feel like a real writer.”

“We _are_ real writers,” Intern corrected. “Ink writing makes us feel like one of the greats of old days passed.”

Spire blushed, making a shrug.

“This diversion from the main project was a welcome test. An analysis, a blueprint for what comes next,” the older dragon continued. 

“November will be the month of the plan. I’m sure this will be the one. We’d gotten sidetracked, lazy, even…”

“Real life is kind of a crutch, sis,” Spire cut in.

“_Crux_, Spire. Real life and friends and family, responsibilities, are the crux of the creative talents. But we will work when we can. We’ll make the time in which to carry on the plan. Especially now that I think we’re ready.”

The captured lights glinted off Spire’s wide eyes.

“Yes, yes,” Intern chuckled, “we’re close to telling the story that matters to us most of all. The project-” 

“And then they can ask the question!” Squealing, Spire hugged herself tightly, almost taking flight.

“Yep. Time to get hyped.”

She remembered, however, a slight altering of that plan. “However, we are low on time. And writing a novella of decent quality in two months, let alone one, is as possible as holding the ocean in a paper bag,” she pondered with a tinge of sadness.

“We _are_ slow writers,” agreed Spire.

“Mhm, so… why not treat this as a certain god treats her… guests? We tell it all in one go, miniature scenes in between omnipotent narrative, until those who read all that is needed to know?”

Spire considered this. “No Discord Murder Party, no Barfé Street, which means no Dove Ghirar, which in itself means-”

“Exactly. So why not treat it in the same fashion as Her loyal Witch, or She Herself?”

“And the Black Stars were intertwined in their childhoods quite a bit!”

“Correct. So it must be told this way.”

Intern hummed to herself a melody, random and off-key, but not looking to impress anyone at all. Spire had already snatched a pen, off of which she sucked the grease, and a battered green journal in which the twenty-four tales had been written, and the seven flubs ignored.

She asked, “You’ll tell me if something sounds… incorrect, right?”

Intern patted her sister’s horn. “Always. I am your spirit of editing, your… writing conscience, even. And it’s the first draft, don’t forget.”

Making a salute, Spire put the pen to the green lines and started off.

“’This is the story of the strife of Crystal Springs, of…’ Hmm, ‘of two childhoods crashing into one brittle bond friendship, one day to metamorphize into steel of devotion.

“’This is the story of Evanlyn Bethany Marie and Elias Joseph Wreath.’“


End file.
